Page 24 - LOTN Spring Issue 52 2023

FAITH AND CULTURE

"not worthless, not slight, not contentious and when Adomnan wrote the Life of Columba a hundred
Not a hero vigorous towards Conall’s covenant. years later, it was specifically to establish that the first
His blessing turned them, the mouths of the fierce ones Abbot of Iona was a man who walked with God in a truly
Who lived on the Tay, to the will of the King" extraordinary way.
There is convincing humility in the missionary work of
The song is an early work in Gaelic literature. It also tells Columba, from conflict, penitence and resolution, to a
us that Columba ministered in Tayside. Atholl means New lasting legacy of peace, expressed in the form of a dove; a
Ireland (Ath Fhotla), and the old Celtic kings and earls of universal symbol.
Atholl were distant kindred of Columba. By the time St The Book of Kells is one of a group of manuscripts which
Augustine landed in Kent, Columba and his missionaries include the Cathach of St Columba, an insular psalter
had already converted the Picts and built a monastery on written in the late sixth century. The manuscript consists of
the banks of the upper Tay, at Dunkeld. Psalms 30:13 to 105:13, assumed to have been the work of
Little known is the fact that in the months before his Columba, and possibly written in Scotland.
death, Columba became unable to walk, and relied on "‘And truly this day is a Sabbath, being for me the last
being assisted in a cart, between the monastery and the day of this present life, in which after the troubles of my
western shore. labours, I shall go to rest".
Adomnan writes that miracles occurred at the grave of Columba died on Saturday, 9 June 597, on the island of
Columba, and evidence was emerging of a cult around his Iona.
body. Wells blessed by the saint became places of healing, We celebrate St Columba’s feast day on June 9, for not
and places of prayer became places of sanctuary. The grave only a great missionary saint who won a whole kingdom
of a saint was said to join heaven and earth - the distance to Christ, but also a statesman, a scholar, a poet, and the
between the living and the dead. founder of numerous churches and monasteries
The Christian tradition was dying for want of being told,

Oot an Aboot

with Ron Smith

Chapel in the Rocks

t is not often that you find a complete chapel in a
large hole in the side of a mountain, but that is just
what you discover at Kaltbad on mount Rigi, the
I“Queen of the Mountains” as she was christened by
the famous German writer Goethe. St Michaels's Chapel, Rigi, Kaltbad
Switzerland was created in 1291 when the ruling families from several wonderful footpaths you can take from here.
Uri, Schwyz, and Unterwalden formed the Swiss Confederation If you take the one to Känzeli, you can see the geology of the
on August 1, 1291. The event took place in a field beside the mountain closely. It is made up of pebbles of various sizes, all
large Vierwaldstattersee lake, not far from Luzern. This beautiful worn perfectly smooth by millions of years of rolling around
part of a beautiful country has attracted tourists ever since, and in rivers, all fused together - “lithified” to form a bobbly, warm
Luzern, at the outflow of the lake, has flourished. From the town, red rock surface which looks like it will crumble away at any
the lake view is dominated by the Rigi. minute. Suddenly you are passing a vertical gap in this rock, with
The world’s second ever rack railway, and Europe’s first, climbs a battered old metal sign indicating a chapel. You walk between
from the lakeside up fearsome gradients to the summit, pausing the rock and suddenly you are in a natural large hole, open to the
about halfway at a village perched on a ledge, called Kaltbad, sky, with a delightful chapel in front of you - St Michael’s Chapel
which means “Cold Bath”. Here there are some hotels and shops, in the Rocks.
and as it faces south it is a warm, sunny place to stay. There are
In earlier days it was called “Schwesternborn”, which means
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